


Forgive Us Our Trespasses

by Saucery



Series: Space Husbands [2]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Aggression, Alternate Universe, Antagonism, Banter, Blind Character, Blindness, Boys Being Boys, Canon Character of Color, Canon Disabled Character, Class Differences, Class Issues, Conflict, Drama, Falling In Love, Fight Sex, First Meetings, Flirting, Foreshadowing, Frottage, Gardens & Gardening, Jedi, Jedi Temple, Kissing, Love/Hate, M/M, METAPHORICAL PEACHES OH MY, Making Out, Martial Arts, Nature, Non-Explicit Sex, Opposites Attract, Overly Lyrical Descriptions of Sex, Padawan, Poetic, Poverty, Romance, Seduction, Self-Esteem Issues, Sexual Content, Sexual Tension, Size Difference, Size Kink, Snark, Space Husbands, Sparring, Temptation, The Force, Trespasser, Young Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-27
Updated: 2016-12-27
Packaged: 2018-09-12 12:32:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9071854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saucery/pseuds/Saucery
Summary: An alternate universe in which Chirrut is a young Padawan at the still-thriving temple in Jedha, and Baze is a kyber miner with one hell of a chip on his shoulder.
Or, the Force plays matchmaker in the form of a peach. Yes, a peach.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I HAD A VISION OF CHIRRUT AS A NIMBLE TEENY TINY TWINK AND I FAILED TO RESIST, I FAILED

* * *

 

The temple gardens were an oasis on Jedha, the trees laden with fruit and the vines heavy with flowers. In the mornings, _tottakoo_ parrots chittered from the foliage in flitting flashes of orange, and in the evenings, fireflies glowed as they danced through the leaves, as if the stars themselves had descended from the skies to frolic amongst the bushes.

It was neither morning nor evening, now. It was the noon-hour, the hour in which the gardens were most redolent, soaking up the meager warmth of Jedha’s sun and conspiring to produce a scent that befuddled and bewitched. Honeyed orchids of gold and violet dangled like ornaments from twining trellises, their petals shifting in the breeze. Their thick, intoxicating fragrance sickened Baze.

It sickened him because, while everybody else on this desert moon shivered and struggled under the shadow of NaJedha that half-hid their sun from them, these hypocritical Jedi lived in palatial splendor, using their technology to create summery retreats only for themselves. They claimed the Force connected all beings, but they used it solely to benefit themselves while condemning innocent civilians to scrounge for scraps.

They scrounged like Baze, whose poverty and lack of an education meant that the only job he could find was as a courier of kyber crystals. It was a back-breaking and, worse, spirit-breaking job.

Baze hauled his sack of kyber crystals further up the hill, and would’ve bypassed the gardens as he always did on the lonely path to and from the mines, except that, hanging upon a low branch just beyond the high fence, he saw—

A peach.

It blushed, pink and obscene, advertising its juiciness like a tart on the roadside of Jedha’s prostitution district. Baze froze, sack weighing a ton on his back, thirst drying up his throat and hunger gnawing in his belly, and he thought, distinctly: _Fuck it_.

The temple owed him a meal. He’d passed this way a thousand times, doing thankless work to help the Jedi assemble their stupid laser swords, but they hadn’t had the courtesy to so much as set up a drinking fountain to ease his parched tongue. Or the tongues of his fellow couriers, whenever they trudged by.

Dumping his sack, Baze grabbed onto the wooden fence and catapulted himself over it. He landed ankle-deep in lush grass that brushed, oddly sentient, against his bare, blistered feet. Each blade of grass stirred independently of all the other blades, and its gentle furring against him felt strangely as if it were attempting to soothe him, to heal the cracks on his heels that stung and ached with every step.

It was unnerving. Baze ignored it, vengefully determined to trample over the tiny, star-shaped blossoms that peeked out from amidst the flowerbeds, but somehow, he wound up seeking the circular paving stones that allowed him passage through the gardens without doing any harm.

That was only common sense, he reassured himself. It wouldn’t do to announce his presence in the gardens by leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. He was a trespasser, and trespassers had to be stealthy. Baze took cover behind the occasional hedge as he slunk along, wary of any Jedi that might be about, but he saw none.

Minutes later, he was below the branch upon which that tempting peach hung, conveniently within his reach. But as soon as he sought to pluck it, an object whizzed past him and lodged itself in the decorative pillar behind him.

It was a knife. With an elegant handle of white bone and a deadly edge that curved inward, like a claw.

Baze whirled around.

There, in the clearing at the border of which the peach tree stood, sat a boy of no more than nineteen, cross-legged and straight-backed and evidently meditating. He was clad in a black tunic and black breeches, with a crimson cape fanning out behind him. How had Baze not seen him? Had the nearness of the peach proved too distracting?

“That peach is temple property,” said the youth, eyes opening from what must have been a meditative trance. They were a ghostly blue, those eyes, like the snow-dusted ice that shone upon the steppes, glittering and unknowable. “You trespass, which is already a crime, but you are on the brink of committing another—theft. Kindly leave.”

A Padawan, judging from his age. It galled Baze that this slip of a creature, who was at least five years younger than he was, had the temerity to order him about. He scowled, desperate to wipe the smug superiority off that pretty face. “Yeah?” Baze taunted. “Isn’t the peach part of the Force? If the Force has no boundaries, the peach can’t belong to anyone, can it?”

The boy tilted his head, considering. “True,” he said quietly, and Baze blinked. “But that does not excuse you from the norms of common decency. You may not continue trespassing here. Leave.”

“Decency?” Baze said incredulously. “You Jedi mine our crystals and fatten your pockets with the tech you build with them, but do you share that tech with us? No.”

It was the Padawan’s turn to blink. “You misunderstand. It is not that we do not wish to share our ’sabers and energy inventions with you, but that only those who are Force-sensitive or Force-capable can use them, and members of Jedha’s general populace, like you, are not either.”

“Right,” Baze snorted. “ _The Force_. What creative propaganda to fool the people with, to persuade them that you aren’t robbing them blind. To persuade them to work like dogs to mine your crystals, because working like dogs for the amazing Jedi is better than working for the Hutts, isn’t it?”

“You compare us to the Hutts?” At last, a hint of anger. “Did you not yourself refer to the Force earlier?”

“I was being sarcastic. Did you think I was serious? Sheesh. What else can I expect from an over-protected Jedi lordling?”

“I am not a Jedi yet,” said the Padawan, his voice infuriatingly cool again. Cool and composed. Did meditating give him that calm disposition, or was he born with it? “Nor am I a sheltered lordling.”

“Says you,” said Baze, aware that he was acting childish, but uncaring of the consequences. “All you do is sit around daydreaming and calling it meditation. I bet you can’t fight worth shit. I bet you couldn’t beat me if I was blind.”

Those eerie blue eyes widened, and the boy chuckled in amusement. “Heh,” he said, his mirth only making him prettier, curse him. “You are mistaken. It is I that am blind.”

_Ah_. That explained why the Padawan’s eyes only hovered about Baze, never to quite settle on him. Baze had figured it was because he deemed Baze beneath him. Still. Baze was not letting this go. He had a point to make. A point that had been eating at him ever since he’d started working in the mines, and he’d finally found the opportunity to drive it home. It wasn’t like he planned on actually harming the kid; he’d pull his punches. “So what? If you’re Force-capable or whatever, it won’t matter, will it? Won’t the Force guide you to safety?” Baze steadied his feet upon the grass, adopting a fighting stance. “Spar with me. Best of three. Let’s see who wins. If I win, you don’t report me.”

“I cannot fight an untrained civilian. I might hurt—”

“Hurt me?” Baze scoffed. “I’m three heads taller than you and twice your girth. And I’ve trained plenty on the streets. Hit me.”

“Did you mean that colloquially or literally?”

Baze fumed. He yanked the knife out of the pillar—how had those skinny arms managed a throw powerful enough to penetrate plastistone?—and threw it back, so that it struck the dirt in front of the boy, tip-down and vibrating.

There was a brief silence. “So be it,” said the boy. “I accept your challenge. May I ask who it is that I am to fight?” 

“Baze. Baze Malbus. And you?”

“Chirrut Îmwe.” The Padawan smiled charmingly, as if they were introducing themselves at a ball. “And I assure you, the pleasure will be all mine.”

In an instant—before Baze could do more than flinch—Chirrut had moved, uncoiling from his lotus position like a whip from a slaver’s hand, a black-and-crimson blur like that of bloodied leather, eager to shred more flesh. Baze leapt backward, but Chirrut was inexplicably already where Baze had leapt to, as if he had foreseen the action even before Baze’s lizard brain had decided what to do.

The staff that had been lying beside Chirrut as he meditated was now twirling through the air, faster and faster, pausing only to tap lightly against Baze’s shin, too lightly to bruise. “Match one goes to me,” said Chirrut.

Baze kicked outward, only to be foiled again as Chirrut danced gracefully away. They swung and parried, Baze ducking to avoid the staff, but it was useless. 

A second tap glanced off Baze’s forearm, and Chirrut said cheerfully, “And that’s match two! Also mine.”

Even more than Chirrut’s unnatural speed, it was the lightness of those taps that was the most aggravating thing, the most patronizing thing. It wasn’t Baze who was pulling his punches. “Don’t toy with me,” Baze snarled, and Chirrut grinned, only slightly breathless as opposed to Baze’s outright panting.

“But you’re such a delicious toy.”

What?

Baze’s surprise at that apparent flirtation cost him a crucial moment, during which a third tap slapped his left calf. “Match three is likewise mine,” Chirrut said, the insufferable _brat_ , and neatly arced his staff downward in a swipe that tripped Baze up and sent him falling to the ground with a meaty thud.

The impact knocked a grunt out of Baze, only to be followed by a long groan when Chirrut landed on top of him, staff angled sideways and pressing into Baze’s Adam’s apple.

“Submit,” Chirrut said, and now he was panting. He was flushed, and the blueness of his eyes was both darker and hotter, not ice-like as it had been before but flame-like, as unwavering as the blue at the very center of a flame.

For some reason, it made Baze hotter as well, made him realize that he was sweaty and filthy in his rags and had a slender body plastered against his, all wiry muscle and exquisite balance, lithe thighs bracketing his hips. He glared up at Chirrut. “I scarcely scored a hit on you.”

“Correction. You scored no hits on me.”

“Hmph. You must be genetically enhanced. You could’ve told me.”

“I did tell you that I’d use the Force. That was the whole issue this fight was supposed to settle, wasn’t it?”

“I don’t believe in your crappy Force.”

“My ‘crappy’ Force secured me a victory in a spar against an opponent who…” Chirrut dropped his staff to the side and ran his palms over Baze’s shoulders and chest. “…mm, who truly does outsize me.” A sly, contemplative pause. “All over, I assume.”

Baze coughed in shock. “Are you—”

“Commenting on the fact that your absolutely spectacular package is growing increasingly palpable? Yes, I am.”

Fuck. Baze was getting hard. He’d _been_ getting hard. It was all Chirrut’s fault, sitting on Baze as if he’d like to ride Baze’s cock, and that… that was not a mental image Baze needed. He hated the confusion of lust and anger that roiled within him, frustration grating against frustration, each sparking off the other. He could just shove Chirrut off him and flee before he was reported, flee like a coward and with nothing to show for it—but screw it, if he couldn’t have that peach, then he’d have _this_.

He surged up to mash his lips against Chirrut’s, but Chirrut only made an accepting, downright serene noise that got on Baze’s nerves, like Chirrut had predicted this would happen before they’d begun sparring, or possibly even before that peach tree had been planted. Who the fuck sounded like that while getting kissed? What would it take to fluster this bastard?

Baze licking him open, it seemed. Chirrut quivered and a gasp escaped him, a gasp that was small but no less licentious for it. Baze’s own hands were full with Chirrut, with the subtle roundness of Chirrut’s ass, but instead of resisting his grip Chirrut only melted into it, undulating against Baze in lazy circles.

What had started as a frenzied kiss transformed into something far softer and more frightening, frightening because it was sliding, like the sweetest, slowest of blades, between Baze’s ribs. It pierced his heart, which welled up in a gush of heat that could have been blood or candle-wax or the simple, beautiful despair of knowing that he was gone, forever, and that he’d never get himself back.

“Oh,” said Chirrut, between kisses. “Oh, what the Force shows me of you. All the red in you. The rage. The _want_.”

_It’s not you that I want_ , Baze would have loved to say, except that it would’ve been too blatant a lie, especially with Baze’s fingers tangling in Chirrut’s hair and Baze rolling them over until Chirrut was beneath him, the loamy, mossy odor of soil rising around them. It surrounded them as if taking them into itself, into the land and into the life that pulsed within it, a throb that rang ever-louder in Baze’s ears, as though it were absorbing him. It was terrifying. It was ecstatic.

Chirrut’s legs spread, knees lifting to cradle Baze’s waist, and as Baze bucked helplessly, Chirrut dragged his swollen, spit-sticky mouth along Baze’s jaw. He was chanting, over and over: “I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me. I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me.” Then he looked up at Baze, eyes unseeing but joyous, and whispered: “The Force is in _you_. And I am one with you.”

Baze came.

He came in his trousers like a hapless virgin, growling through it because it pissed him off, sobbing through it because it was that good, but he couldn’t stop it, didn’t want to stop it, damn it all, please, Chirrut, _please_ —

Chirrut was shuddering underneath him, coming apart, clutching at Baze and saying, “Yes, yes, yes.” When Baze collapsed, it was only Chirrut’s embrace that held him together, because there was a great tide that was leaving Baze, as if the vastness that had filled him was flowing out of him, and he was merely a broken pitcher smashed to pieces, spilling its contents until it was empty of everything.

Everything but Chirrut.

They lay there, catching their breaths, as the wind grew cooler and the sky dimmer, and the new wordlessness they shared drew to an end. They rose to depart, Chirrut to his studies and Baze to his sack of kyber crystals, that he still had to deliver to the storage-house adjacent to the temple. He’d be reprimanded for the delay.

The prospect of a reprimand would have rankled, were Baze not feeling overwhelmed. It was as if the experience of touching Chirrut had erased all his data stores and replaced them with memory after memory of Chirrut: how Chirrut fought, how Chirrut moaned and how Chirrut surrendered. If Baze had subroutines, they’d been overwritten, like those of a reprogrammed droid.

Before they parted ways at the fence, Chirrut unlocked it for him, rendering jumping over it unnecessary. Neither of them discussed whether or when they would next meet. Perhaps they both sensed that their meeting again was inevitable. Not that Baze would ever admit to sensing anything.

“I should return,” Chirrut said. “Master Mothma awaits me.”

The idea of someone else “awaiting” Chirrut was irritating, and Baze harrumphed.

“You should train to become a warrior,” Chirrut murmured. “You’re a talented fighter.”

“Talented? I went down in three strikes.”

“You _lasted_ for three strikes. Against a trained Force user. A Padawan of the Jedi Order.”

“A genetically engineered nutcase,” Baze said gruffly.

Chirrut leaned into Baze and laughed. It was warm, and close, and ruffled Baze’s mostly-undone braids. “I’ll convince you that the Force is real. Eventually.”

“No, you won’t.”

There was a mysterious sadness in Chirrut’s eyes, but there was a happiness, too, a certainty, a faith. “Yes, I will.”

 

* * *

**fin.**

**Author's Note:**

> Like my writing? Want updates and sneak previews? Follow me on [Tumblr](http://saucefactory.tumblr.com/)! I also run a blog for my [original gay fiction](http://dominiquefrost.tumblr.com/).


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